0D Beat DropReview

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Puyo Puyo's musically inclined cousin.

By Daemon Hatfield

0-D Beat Drop is a music puzzle game that should get along well with fans of Lumines. You'll find falling blocks set to groovy techno beats and psychedelic laser visuals. But, unlike Lumines, Beat Drop requires players to have a keen sense of rhythm if they're going to represent on the leaderboards. Those with musical ability will have a definite advantage here. The included tunes are acceptable slices of Japanese electronica, but Beat Drop really gets its groove on when you use the built-in music analyzer to play along with your own soundtrack.

Visually, 0-D Beat Drop looks like yet another clone of the Tetris/Columns/Puyo Puyo-style puzzle game. Colored shapes drop from above and you must organize them in the playing field, being careful not to let them reach the top of the screen. But clearing the shapes will require you to pay close attention to the pulse of the soundtrack. When at least three pieces of the same color are touching you can clear them by performing the titular Beat Drop. Pressing the X button will send the piece that is currently falling rocketing towards the ground. If you timed it right this will initiate the Beat Drop and all pieces below with connecting same colors will be cleared and sent to your opponent's screen as garbage (a la Puyo Puyo). Time it wrong and the piece will still blast to the ground but nothing will be cleared.

Click here to see how to add your own beats to the game.

To assist you in finding the beat is the "Side Beat Meter" on the right edge of your playing field. It will rise and fall in time with the song, giving you a visual cue as to its beats per minute (BPM). Achieving successful consecutive beat drops will build your bonus meter, giving you big score multipliers. However, as your bonus meter increases the less forgiving the Side Beat Meter will be, meaning your presses of the X button will have to be more and more precise. It's great fun as long as you have a natural sense of rhythm.

Beat Drop refers to that "garbage" I mentioned as Shadow Pieces. The bigger your combo the more Shadow Pieces will be sent to your opponent -- or vice versa. An indicator at the top of your screen displays how many pieces you are sending or receiving. You can stave off the onslaught by creating Beat Drops, but as soon as you miss the Shadow Pieces will be dumped in your lap. These interlopers can be turned into normal pieces by clearing shapes next to them.

0-D Beat Drop has quite a few game modes to sort through:

Planet Quest: Play through 10 stages versus computer opponents.

Survival Four: A battle royale versus you and three computer opponents.

Co-op with COM: Team up with a computer player and wipe the floor with another AI duo.

Time Attack: Reach the target score as fast as you can.

Task: Complete a sequence of specific objectives, such as "make a combo of three chains" or "score XXX amount of points in one Beat Drop."

Multiplayer: Two- and four-player co-op and versus games that can be played locally and online.

One of the coolest features of 0-D Beat Drop is the Beat-O-Matic, which will analyze music from a USB drive or your 360 hard drive, determine its BPM, and sync the game to your sounds. Somehow, beat drops are much more satisfying when timed with your favorite music. You can analyze a set of songs and the game will play through them all like an album.

The Verdict

The ability to analyze your own music and wrap the gameplay around it makes 0-D Beat Drop a standout puzzle game on Xbox Live Arcade. It definitely borrows a lot from similar games (you might even say steals) but the demanding rhythmic component here makes the end result unique. Fans of falling-shape puzzlers like Puyo Puyo or music games like Lumines should definitely give this one a drop.